Comparing the handed down vessels, it can be seen that the five-section animal mask pattern on the Cong-style bottle is the only pattern on the Cong-style bottle from the official kiln in the Song Dynasty.
For example, there are Southern Song Dynasty official kiln Cong-style vases that are stored in the Wanwan Palace Museum, the Neon Tokyo National Museum, and the Yinglun Daweide Foundation.
In October 1995, the Song Dynasty official kiln Cong-style vase sold at Lot 1016 in Hanhai, Shendu, was decorated with a five-section animal mask pattern;
The carcass of this Cong-style bottle is flawless, but the sound when knocked is like a tile. This is the most unique and different from the crisp sound of the official kilns of the Southern Song Dynasty.
Of course, it is also different from the sound of metal and stone imitating official organs in the Ming and Qing Dynasties.
In particular, the texture of the slightly glossy light gray fetal bones is not as fine as that of the official kiln in the suburbs of the Southern Song Dynasty, but it is firmer and far more moist than that of the Ru kiln in the Northern Song Dynasty.
This is in line with the laws of development of the times and the soil conditions of the region where Bianjing is located;
The Cong-style vases of this period had thick and moist glazes, and the glaze surface was slightly uneven, with a small amount of broken bubbles and glaze shrinkage spots.
Different from the smooth and bright glaze of Yongzong and Qianlong imitating official organs, it is definitely the style of the era that the celadon glaze should have in the Northern Song Dynasty;
The glaze layer is densely covered with large and small bubbles, which look like "foam and beads".
Different from the Ming and Qing imitation organs, the bubbles in the glaze are more regular in size, dense and orderly;
The feet are wide and thick, the feet are rounded, and the ridges of the feet show clear bamboo scratches.
This is a common style of circle foot in Ru kiln and Longquan kiln.
It is also an interpretation of the Northern Song Dynasty official kiln on the basis of the Ru kiln's square corner box and the large circle foot Ru kiln wash;
The soles of the feet are coated with protective glaze, and the color is deep, which is undoubtedly the craft characteristic of famous kilns in the Song Dynasty.
Typical examples include Jun kiln, Longquan kiln in the Northern Song Dynasty and Xiunei Siguan kiln in the Southern Song Dynasty. They often use sesame paste-colored glaze or ocher red glaze to smear the base for decoration and avoid sticking to the kiln;
The inscription is carved by chisels, and the font is vigorous and standardized. As for whether it was carved in the Northern Song Dynasty, further research is needed.
However, as far as the word "记" in inscriptions is concerned, the Song Dynasty used it most frequently among all dynasties.
The most classic application was in the Song Dynasty, not only on porcelain, but also on seals, calligraphy and paintings, etc., with a distinct flavor of the times.
In addition, in a modern Cong-style bottle handed down from ancient times, the originally transparent and colorless openings inside and outside the vessel have turned to varying degrees of light yellow;
The glaze inside the sole is as bright as ever, and the ice cracks are still colorless and transparent.
The first two items are probably related to the worship of the sun and moon and the incense in Guanyin Temple, as well as the wiping and touching of donors and collectors;
The latter item should be related to the fact that the straight wall of the object itself unintentionally acts as a barrier to prevent the intrusion of the outside world.
These also contain a large amount of information, which is a strong evidence of the true nature of the Cong-style vase in the Song Dynasty and its longevity over nine centuries.
With such a classic shape, Chen Wenzhe naturally wanted to imitate it first.
When he really wanted to imitate the Cong-style bottle, Chen Wenzhe discovered that this kind of bottle was really interesting.
For example, Cong-style bottles first appeared in the Song Dynasty, and are generally believed to have appeared in the Southern Song Dynasty.
However, it has been discovered that Cong-style bottles have been produced since the Northern Song Dynasty.
Now the Qilu Buyi Zhuang family has collected a Cong-style vase from the Northern Song Dynasty.
This confirms that Cong-style bottles were first produced in the Northern Song Dynasty.
The collection is 6 cm high and 9.5 cm wide. The base and mouth of the bottle are both round, and the diameter is 9 cm.
It is square on the outside and round on the inside, with a Bagua printed pattern on the outer wall. The workmanship is fine, the lines are smooth, and it is regular and elegant. It is a molded composite.
The style of antique vase was popular in the Song Dynasty, and this style of vase was modeled on the shape of the jade cong from the Liangzhu Culture of the Neolithic Age, and was modified.
Both the official kilns and Longquan kilns of the Southern Song Dynasty had this shape.
Among jade wares, Cong is generally a square cylindrical jade ware with a round hole inside. It is a ritual vessel of the Neolithic Age.
The shape of the vessel is round mouth, short neck, long square column body, ring foot, mouth and foot are similar in size. Some vessels are decorated with raised horizontal lines on all sides.
The inside of the vessel is round and the outside is square, so as to resemble the round sky and the earth.
"The Rites of Zhou" records: "Use jade as six utensils to honor the four directions of heaven and earth. Use green jade to honor the sky, yellow cong to honor the earth, green gui to the east, red seal to the south, white amber to the west, and Xuan Huang to the north. "
The porcelain Cong-style bottle follows the basic shape of the jade cong, except that the jade vessel is round inside and transparent from top to bottom, while the porcelain maker added a circle foot and bottom, evolving into a kind of bottle.
Since its emergence in the Song Dynasty, the firing of Cong-style bottles has been followed into the Yuan Dynasty. Cong-style bottles were common in Longquan kilns in the Yuan Dynasty.
During the Ming Dynasty, Shiwan Kiln in Guangdong Province produced many such bottles.
Ge Kiln also produced Cong-style bottles. Although this kind of Ge Kiln Cong-style bottles are rare, it is not uncommon to imitate Ge Kiln Cong-style bottles in later generations.
For example, there are Cong-style bottles imitating the Eight Diagrams pattern from Ge Kiln during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, and Cong-style bottles imitating the Eight Diagrams pattern from Ge Kiln during the Qianlong Period.
In the Qing Dynasty, official kilns produced a large number of Cong-style bottles, including blue and white, celadon glaze, white glaze, furnace uniform glaze, imitation Jun glaze, imitation official glaze, imitation Ge kiln glaze and other varieties.
What is a famous kiln can actually be seen from the imitations of later generations.
The five famous kilns of the Northern Song Dynasty have imitations in later generations, such as imitation Ru glaze, imitation Ding glaze, imitation Jun glaze, imitation official glaze, imitation Ge kiln glaze, etc. This is clear evidence.
The earliest porcelain Cong-style bottles were found in the Guan Kiln and Longquan Kiln of the Southern Song Dynasty.
In the Shiwan kiln of the Ming Dynasty, moon white glaze was often applied to such shapes.
After entering the Qing Dynasty, the horizontal line decoration on the body of the vessel evolved into Bagua patterns, so it was also called "Bagua bottle" in the later period.
This kind of bottle generally has a round mouth, square body, straight belly, and circle feet.
The body of the vessel is decorated with raised horizontal and vertical lines on all sides, and the mouth is about the same size as the foot.
Different dynasties have their own characteristics in the shape of the utensils.
Song Dynasty official kiln Cong style vase, the vase body is short and large;
The dragon kiln Cong style vase from the Song Dynasty has a long and thin body.
The Longquan kiln of the Yuan Dynasty also fired conjoined cong-style bottles.
Then there are the Ming and Qing dynasties. Taken together, products from the Song Dynasty are still the best and most rare.
In the auction market, any piece is expensive.
In the mid-1990s, Christie's Hong Kong launched a Southern Song Dynasty "pink and blue Cong-style vase" in a spring auction, which was finally sold for HK$253,000;
At the autumn auction in Hanhai, the capital of China, a Song Dynasty official kiln Cong-style vase was sold for 9.02 million yuan.
In the spring auction of 2006, two lots were sold in Hanhai, the capital of China. One was a Southern Song Dynasty official kiln Cong-style vase, and the other was a Southern Song Dynasty Longquan kiln Cong-style vase.
Among them, a Southern Song Dynasty Longquan kiln Cong-style vase was sold for 2.75 million yuan.
Ru kiln also produced many Cong-style bottles, but Ru kiln produced many bottles and the variations of the bottles were rich.
In addition to the well-known dishes, flower pots, and washbasins, Ru Kiln is probably most famous for its bottles.
There are many kinds of paper mallet bottles, jade pot spring bottles, Cong style bottles, bile bottles and so on.
In the Song Dynasty, the ancients began to use porcelain as ritual vessels. The shapes of porcelain ritual vessels were derived from bronze, jade, etc.
Among them, the jade cong with profound meaning is an important object to be imitated.
Porcelain cong-style bottles follow the basic shape of jade cong. There are generally two shapes, one is a multi-section long cong, and the other is a short square short cong.
Among the Cong-style vases produced in the Northern Song Dynasty, there were pink-green glazed Cong-style vases produced by the official kiln, and there were azure-glazed Cong-style vases produced by the Ru kiln.
The characteristics of the Cong-style bottle are that it is square on the outside and round on the inside, with a bottom, short upper and lower necks and short round feet, and horizontal straight lines on the bottle body.